Reforming the Patent System Toward a Minimalist System
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Reforming the Patent System Toward a Minimalist System
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Re: Reforming the Patent System Toward a Minimalist System
#2Patents bring the following trade-off: inventor monopoly defendence vs. block of progress\future use cases utilizing patent. So patents both are enforcing and slowing innovation.
This could be fixed with with the following solution that will maximize public good. There're no good reason for 20 years patent periods in some industries with short cycle of product development, like software, mobile, cloud etc. Cleraly, after first 3-5 years patents start to be either completely useless or slowing down both patent holder's and external innovations. If company is defended by patent, there's no urgency for innovation. This is unfair advantage.
Re: Reforming the Patent System Toward a Minimalist System
#3I just recently wrote a paper on software patents. Although we could suggest a shorter patent term, there are many practicalities in the process of granting patents that makes it an inferior solution to abolish software patents altogether.
Even without patents, we still have copyrights, "dress trade" and other nuances of the legal system, before we really have a worry-free, innovative environment.
God and the compilers bless the brave man to embrace such noble cause.
Re: Reforming the Patent System Toward a Minimalist System
#4From the blog post:
"Although ending the patent system is a clean solution to all the problems induced by modern patenting, it clearly is not desirable given the importance of industries like the pharmaceutical industry. Since this industry spends on average hundreds of millions of dollars bringing to market a successful drug, pharmaceutical companies would not invest such large sums without the protection of patents (or without other benefits). Probably the best solution would be to maintain the patent system on drugs and a few other products that are expensive to innovate and cheap to copy, and eliminate patents on everything else. In particular, this means eliminating patents in the software industry, the source of much of the patent litigation and patent trolling."
I generally agree with this, but I think it's a little analytically lazy. I think the Supreme Court was right to recognize that we should not just categorically ban certain kinds of patents. Instead, we should articulate the distinctions between the two industries and reformulate the patent eligibility criterion in terms of this distinction.
Re: Reforming the Patent System Toward a Minimalist System
#5I just recently wrote a paper on software patents. Although we could suggest a shorter patent term, there are many practicalities in the process of granting patents that makes it an inferior solution to abolish software patents altogether. Even without patents, we still have copyrights, "dress trade" and other nuances of the legal system, before we really have a worry-free, innovative environment. God and the compile…
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Re: Reforming the Patent System Toward a Minimalist System
#6From the blog post: "Although ending the patent system is a clean solution to all the problems induced by modern patenting, it clearly is not desirable given the importance of industries like the pharmaceutical industry. Since this industry spends on average hundreds of millions of dollars bringing to market a successful drug, pharmaceutical companies would not invest such large sums without the protection of patents…
"expensive to innovate and cheap to copy" sounds like eligibility criteria to me.
Re: Reforming the Patent System Toward a Minimalist System
#7From the blog post: "Although ending the patent system is a clean solution to all the problems induced by modern patenting, it clearly is not desirable given the importance of industries like the pharmaceutical industry. Since this industry spends on average hundreds of millions of dollars bringing to market a successful drug, pharmaceutical companies would not invest such large sums without the protection of patents…
We'd probably have better and cheaper drugs without the patent system. If more companies can make and sell the same drug, more companies can also fund research.
Patents should be categorically banned.
Re: Reforming the Patent System Toward a Minimalist System
#8From the blog post: "Although ending the patent system is a clean solution to all the problems induced by modern patenting, it clearly is not desirable given the importance of industries like the pharmaceutical industry. Since this industry spends on average hundreds of millions of dollars bringing to market a successful drug, pharmaceutical companies would not invest such large sums without the protection of patents…
"expensive to innovate and cheap to copy" sounds like eligibility criteria to me.
Any big company can pour any large amount of money to "innovate", which will probably help them bring the product to market sooner, but that isn't justification for a temporary monopoly grant.
"Cheap to copy" sounds like something to be embraced.
Re: Reforming the Patent System Toward a Minimalist System
#9From the blog post: "Although ending the patent system is a clean solution to all the problems induced by modern patenting, it clearly is not desirable given the importance of industries like the pharmaceutical industry. Since this industry spends on average hundreds of millions of dollars bringing to market a successful drug, pharmaceutical companies would not invest such large sums without the protection of patents…
We'd probably have better and cheaper drugs without the patent system. If more companies can make and sell the same drug, more companies can also fund research. Patents should be categorically banned.
no. the upfront costs for pharma development are prohibitive. the chances of a new molecule making it through clinical trials is really small.
the economic crisis has put a lot of emphasis on efficacy for inclusion on various formulary schemes, be it private ones like in the US or state-run ones like in EU. now you need an approved product that is also not only marginally better than existing stuff. just takes away some nasty side effect? no reimbursement for you, pharma-economics trumps this.
so, you have run ups of 10 years to line up a single new drug. scientists, the whole approval chain, supply chain, etc. then you get approval and your drug is good enough to be reimbursed, hooray. as the FDA process is public, your generic competitors have been watching - now that you have proven everything, they can flood the market and can undercut you significantly as they do not need to recuperate the initial investment of 10 years.
you have this happen once or twice and then say fuck it. let's play the lottery, better ROI.
the whole patent system was invented for a reason. it makes perfect sense for pharma. abolish it there and drug development will only happen through government programs.
Re: Reforming the Patent System Toward a Minimalist System
#10Reform could also take the form of tightening the 'novelty' and 'nonobvious' requirements. For example:
• independent invention should be an absolute defense for infringement, and within a certain timeframe, evidence of obviousness as well
• allow a review process (perhaps when a patent is challenged) where a jury of skilled practitioners is given the same motivating problem brief and a few days to outline possible solutions. Anything they describe would be deemed 'obvious'